She Accepted Divorce, He Panicked

Scarlett's POV

"Are you here to gloat?!"

The whole villa was covered in the twilight's dim orange glow, casting a surreal bloody shade on the lake's clear green surface. Sebastian stops by the beech tree closest to the lake, and I walk over to Ava, who stands on the dock that reaches over the water, arms foldedContent property of NôvelDra/ma.Org.

in front of her chest. These are her first words when I approach.

I look back at Sebastian. He leans against the beech tree with one leg curled up casually, too far to see clear of his look.

"Why didn't you say that when he could hear you?" I retort back, and Ava turns around with a deadly calm look. At the moment, I do not fully understand this look.

"You finally stole him from me. He won't reply to my texts, and he won't even talk to me anymore. Are you happy now?" Ava says coldly, ignoring my sarcasm, "You don't even love him. You took him away just because I love him."

"That's exactly what YOU did to me! You stole him from me when you didn't even know him!" I laugh in disbelief. Is this how she justifies everything she has done? By lying to herself, too???

Do we live in the same world??? She kept Sebastian and turned him against me for years when she knew I was the little girl Sebastian wanted to protect, and that's her way of loving him?!

"He wasn't in love with you! He wouldn't be in love with a poor, dirty little girl if I didn't nurture that love over this decade!" Ava fights back as if she really believes in this logic, "I bet you enjoyed it very much when you told him that I wasn't that piece of trash he rescued!" At that moment I thought about letting Damian Vanderbilt do whatever he wanted with her.

"I haven't, but thanks for the tip because I will try to enjoy it when I do," I roll my eyes, bored of our meaningless fight about Sebastian, "I'm actually here to talk about Damian Vander--"

Ava raises her hand to slap me, and I catch her wrist in mid-air.

"What the fuck?" I let go when she starts struggling. I glance at Sebastian, but he is not coming over.

"Do you have to come after everything I want?!" Ava raises her voice, only to nervously glance in Sebastian's direction. Seeing that he is too far away to hear us, she relaxes a bit, "I'm warning you, Scarlett Fuller, stay away from him! I'm leaving!"

I grab her arm to stop her. Sometimes I wonder what's in this woman's head. Glue???!

"I know he can be charming, but he

is not interested in you in the way you imagine," If I didn't see how spellbound he made Lilith, I wouldn't be so patient with Ava right now, "But he is dangerous, with power even your dear father can't begin to match. I know you think I hate you. I don't like you, for many reasons you know well. But I don't want you to die, the least because of me. So--"

"Because of you?!" Ava cuts me off with a cold snort, "Do you really think the Vanderbilts would take an infamous girl like you into their family?! Everything you had, you got them on MY parents' dime!"

"I--" What?! I'm daunted in the face

by her blunt attack out of nowhere. I

freeze in confusion, and she, too pauses, seemingly shocked by herself Only after a few seconds, did I finally understand what she was talking about. And she bursts into laughter at the same time,

"You...you knew?" I murmur, staring at her in disbelief. The last shred of sunlight hits us from sideways, making her face half bloody and half in a dark shadow. So her outburst earlier about misunderstanding my intention on Damian Vanderbilt was albbut an act? To divert me from the truth??

It's ridiculous how I thought she was stupid. The real moron tonight is no one but me!

"What do I know?" Ava lets out a cold snort, asking tauntingly.

"You... You knew I was the real lost daughter, and you want to keep that a secret?!" I stare at her scary face turning dimmer as the sun goes down with visible speed, and I feel like I'm looking at a real monster. What kind of a person does that? What kind of a family would raise someone like her?!

"I don't know what you are talking about." Ava smirks, but that only gives me a chill down the spine as if spotted by a poisonous snake.

"Why are you doing this to me? I thought you wanted me out of your family..." I mumble in pure shock, "What could you possibly gain by keeping me from my real family?"

Nothing, I suddenly realize, if my real family's last name wasn't Vanderbilt.